


Momentous Occasion

by silk_knickers



Category: The Covenant (2006)
Genre: College, M/M, Post-Canon, Slash
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2011-12-19
Updated: 2011-12-19
Packaged: 2017-10-27 12:51:38
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 2,475
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/296048
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/silk_knickers/pseuds/silk_knickers
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>It's been two months since Caleb last saw Pogue.</p>
            </blockquote>





	Momentous Occasion

**Author's Note:**

  * For [yabamena](https://archiveofourown.org/users/yabamena/gifts).



Caleb Danvers left Widener Library two hours after it had closed for the night, a light caress of magic opening the locked doors. The November air was bracing when he stepped out into Harvard Yard, and he drew his trench coat tighter around him to ward off the chill. His econ paper was finally finished and ready to be turned in on Monday, and he was looking forward to enjoying the rest of the weekend. It was the Friday before Thanksgiving, and although he still had classes on Monday, he was looking forward to spending at least a few days back in Ipswich.

As he walked across the Yard toward his dorm, his phone rang. "Pogue," he answered, smiling wide with pleasant surprise. "When did you get back in town?"

"A few hours ago. What are you up to tonight?"

"Just finished at the library -- I think the guys in the dorm are throwing a party later tonight. It's The Game this weekend, you know? Want to drop by?"

He could hear his friend stifle a chuckle on the other end of the line. "Spare me another lame Harvard dorm party, please. What is it this time, wines of the Côte Chalonnaise and the works of Samuel Beckett?"

"The Loire and Émile Zola, I think. Did you have a better suggestion?" He swiped his ID at the entrance to Mower and stepped inside.

"There's a new jazz club in the South End. Want to check it out?"

"Sure, sounds great. Are Tyler and Reid coming?"

"Reid's chasing skirts at Jillian's, and Tyler's chasing Reid. You're allowed to have a night out without the kids along, you know."

Caleb laughed. "Okay, fine. Pick me up in an hour?"

"It's a date."  


* * *

  
Pogue was waiting for him on his Ducati on Cambridge Street exactly one hour later. Caleb arched an eyebrow at the ride, but he took the spare helmet without complaint and hopped on behind his friend. He slid his arms around Pogue's waist and leaned close, Pogue's leather jacket crinkling between them. The Ducati purred under them as they headed into Boston.

The bouncer at the club checked their IDs -- faked by one of Reid's Boston University friends, not even magicked -- and let them in despite a skeptical expression. The club was a real dive, the kind of dark and slightly seedy nightclub that would've been swirling with smoke if Massachusetts hadn't banned smoking in bars ages ago. It wasn't very crowded, for a Friday night in the South End. Caleb figured it might just be too early yet; the band was still setting up on the small stage at the far end of the room.

After ordering drinks, the two young men found a table near the stage. Caleb took in the sight of his friend and smiled. Even though it had only been a few weeks since he'd seen him last, it was still the longest the two friends had been apart in years. "So, how was your flight?"

Pogue shrugged. "Long, but I slept most of the way. The airline had those sleeping pod things in first class, you know?"

Caleb nodded with a grin. "And how was the search?"

Pogue sipped at his bourbon before replying. "No sign of him, or any other witches for that matter. I spent most of my time poking around in the Bodleian and the archives at the British Museum. I think I might have to apply to Oxford after all; I was Using a lot more than I would like, breaking in to their libraries all the time."

Caleb sighed. "I guess it was too much to hope for success so soon." After the debacle with Chase Collins the previous fall, all four of them had spent the year with one wary eye open for anything unusual -- waiting for the other shoe to drop. They'd never found his body, after all. Caleb had defeated Chase, but there was no guarantee that he wouldn't pop up again someday, and the Covenant had agreed that it would be better to find him first than to wait around, always looking over their shoulders.

The one good thing to come of Chase's betrayal was that the members of the Covenant had finally woken up to how little they _actually_ knew about their powers -- where they came from, their limits and their liabilities. They decided to do some research -- something few of their most proximate ancestors had bothered with in the heady rush that came with nearly unlimited power. Caleb was digging through old Colonial records in Harvard's libraries for more details about the Massachusetts trials, while Pogue had agreed to spend most of the year after graduation in England, looking for records of the persecutions there that had driven their ancestors to the New World in the first place.

Pogue was grinning at him. "I did find one thing that was interesting, though. There was a copy of the Book of Damnation in the British Museum -- and it isn't the same as ours."

Caleb's eyes widened and he leaned forward excitedly. "That's... that's huge. How different is it? Why didn't you tell us sooner?"

"It's in Middle English or something; I can barely make any sense of it. I stole it and brought it back with me. Maybe your Harvard-educated brain can translate it for the rest of us."

Caleb grimaced at his friend's teasing tone, but before he could think of a suitable retort, the band had taken the stage.  


* * *

  
After the show, Pogue drove Caleb back to campus. Caleb got off the bike on unsteady feet and smiled back at his friend. The bourbon and mellow music had left him feeling loose and relaxed. "You should come up with me," he said impulsively, with a wide grin. "I've got a single. We barely even got to talk tonight."

"I've got a king in the Presidential Suite at the Fairmont Copley Plaza, which is way better than sharing a twin with you," Pogue replied with a laugh. "We can talk again tomorrow. I'll show you the book, see what you think of it."

"Okay, then. Call me," Caleb replied, coming in for one last hug and a friendly pat on the back. He hadn't realized just how much he'd missed his friend -- freshman year and his side research had been keeping him so busy. He stood on the sidewalk for a minute, watching as Pogue rode off.

When he finally turned to head back to his dorm, a darkling was hovering before him on the sidewalk, just inches away. Caleb flinched back at the sight of the ghostly figure and let out a yelp of alarm. The creature's mouth yawned open and it reached toward him, but it disappeared in a puff of vapor.  


* * *

  
"You're sure it was a darkling?" Reid asked. The four men of the Covenant had gathered in Pogue's suite early the next morning, and sat around the long hardwood table.

"Yes, I'm sure. Right out in the open, where anyone could've seen."

"What does it mean?" Tyler asked, sounding worried.

"Nothing good," Caleb replied. He'd hardly slept after seeing the darkling, reviewing his memory of the figure over and over for any clues as to what it portended.

"Do you think Chase is back?" Pogue asked.

"I don't know. I haven't _felt_ anything, like someone using a lot of power, not like last time... but maybe he's just being more careful this time."

"I say we track him down and kick his ass. Four on one this time, none of that honor duel bullshit you pulled last time, Caleb," Reid said, angrily pacing the room. "And we're all Ascended now. He won't find us such easy targets."

Caleb drummed his fingers on the tabletop. "But can we protect everyone? Our families, our friends?"

"Our families know the situation. And we all agreed, no more dating until we get all this sorted out, so no more hostages," Pogue pointed out. "Thanksgiving is this Thursday; we'll just go back to Ipswich a few days early to keep an eye on our families there."

"Chase won't try anything here in the city. He can't want attention any more than the rest of us, right?" Tyler asked hopefully.

"Who knows what that bastard will do?" Reid replied. "He was a fucking lunatic."

"He won't attack us directly, but he might try to intimidate us. From now on, none of us goes anywhere alone. He won't try to fight us if we're together, if we outnumber him," Caleb decided. "We'll all head back to Ipswich this afternoon."

"Fine," Reid said, standing up with a sigh of frustration. "Tyler, come with me. I need to pack."

After the others had left, Pogue stood and went to the minibar. He poured himself a scotch and turned, running a hand through his long hair. "Do you really think it was Chase?"

Caleb frowned. "I don't know. What else could it be?"

Pogue shrugged. "I don't know either, but... the Book of Damnation says that the darklings appear to foreshadow momentous occasions, like one of us Ascending. This is the first all four of us have been together in two months -- maybe that's enough to bring one out? All that power gathered in one place again, and you with your father's share too?"

Caleb shook his head. "I don't know. It's the same problem we've always had... all of this power, and we don't even know what it's _for_. And what if the Book of Damnation is wrong? It was wrong about Robert Putnam's line being extinct."

Pogue downed the rest of his glass and smacked his lips. "I never really trusted the Book anyway. The whole _of Damnation_ part isn't really confidence-inspiring."

Caleb laughed, a short, startled cough. "I never thought of it that way. It's always just been the Book, you know?" He stood and joined Pogue at the bar, pouring himself a drink and refilling Pogue's glass while he was at it. "What about that other version you found? Maybe it holds more answers."

"I'll get it." Pogue crossed into the suite's master bedroom and returned a few minutes later with a thick leather-and-parchment book, yellowed with age and once-frequent handling. The book was noticeably thicker than their own Book of Damnation.

"I could barely understand it," Pogue said as he passed it over to his friend. "According to the museum's records, it predates the King James Bible."

"I just spent half a semester reading _Beowulf_ and _The Canterbury Tales_ for English Lit; let me see if any of it looks familiar. At least make sure it's English." Holding the book midair on a cushion of magical force, he carefully turned the ancient pages with his power -- he was afraid to touch the parchment with his bare hands, as it was clearly very fragile.

The text of the book was in faded black ink on yellowed parchment, spidery letters scrawled across the pages. It was clear that the book had been scribed by multiple hands over many years, or perhaps even centuries. The earliest pages were penned crudely, while later pages had been carefully illuminated, like some monk's text, with painstaking diagrams and images in once-vivid colors. The text in the last quarter of the book was written more densely than the rest, and filled the margins completely; some letters at the edges of the page were lost to wear and age. On the last ten pages, the author had written in black, then turned the page at a ninety degree angle to continue in red ink over the previously written text. Some of it looked like it was in English, albeit an ancient dialect; other parts looked like they were in some kind of cipher or code.

"This is incredible," Caleb exhaled softly.

Pogue moved to stand behind Caleb, leaning in close to read over his shoulder. "You might need to change your major to linguistics to translate it, though," Pogue said, his breath ghosting warmly on Caleb's ear. "It could take a lifetime to figure it out."

"But it will be worth it. Our ancestors fled England ahead of a torch-wielding mob -- what if this book has all the knowledge they couldn't bring with them? All the answers to the questions we've been asking all these years? This could change everything!"

He turned, finding Pogue even closer than he'd thought. Caleb clasped his friend's shoulder excitedly and looked up into Pogue's steady, dark gaze.

"This is why the darkling appeared. This is the momentous occasion."

Pogue leaned toward him, his long hair falling forward to frame his face. He stared down at Caleb, whose heart stuttered at the abrupt change of mood in the room. His voice uncharacteristically husky, Pogue said, "Yeah, I think you're right." Pogue placed a hand on the small of Caleb's back, and leaned forward just a few centimeters more, and...

 _Oh._

Pogue was kissing him.

And, okay, maybe Caleb should've seen it coming, but it felt like he'd been sucker-punched. Or not punched, exactly, but it definitely took his breath away. They hadn't seen each other in weeks -- almost two months, actually -- and then Pogue swept back into town and... wait, that really _had_ been a date last night, hadn't it?

Caleb leaned forward, into the kiss. The Book of Damnation fell onto the table with a dull thud, forgotten for now in the press of more immediate concerns. Caleb's hand slid from where he'd been gripping Pogue's shoulder, up, to caress the back of his friend's neck, pulling him in closer. Pogue moaned in approval, and teased Caleb's mouth with the tip of his tongue.

After a while, they broke apart. Pogue laughed silently, shoulders shaking with quiet mirth as he held his shorter friend. Caleb smiled as if they were sharing a joke, their foreheads touching as they leaned into one another.

"I had no idea..." Caleb said softly, staring at his friend's shoes.

"I realized when I was in England. Every new thing I saw, I wanted to share with you."

"You only called a couple of times!"

"I'm not much of a _feelings_ kind of guy; I wasn't even going to say anything, but you got so damned excited looking at that book..."

"I understand. I'm pretty irresistible."

Pogue laughed again, punching him gently on the arm and then taking a half step back.

"No, hey!" Caleb protested, grabbing at the front of Pogue's shirt. "It's okay. It's more than okay. It just... never really occurred to me."

"You invited me up last night," Pogue countered.

"You turned me down," Caleb replied.

"You were drunk."

"Not _that_ drunk," Caleb admitted sheepishly. "Maybe I had half an idea."

"So... do you want to give this a try?"

"Yeah," Caleb said, putting his arms around Pogue's waist. "I think I do."


End file.
